The present invention relates to passenger vehicles and seating systems. More particularly, the present invention relates to a vehicle seat adapted for use in connection with enhanced capacity vehicles such as station wagons, sport utility vehicles and vans that have an enlarged cabin area for carrying either more cargo, more passengers or both than a conventional sedan.
It is known in the art of automotive vehicle body design to provide enhanced capacity vehicles with forward seat assemblies for a driver and a front passenger, a rear seat assembly, and an intermediate seat assembly located at a mid-vehicle position. As both cargo and passenger carrying capacity are valued, it is desirable to design the intermediate and rear seat assemblies to carry additional passengers and additional cargo, and to be convertible easily between an enhanced passenger carrying configuration and an enhanced cargo carrying configuration.
Many of the rear seat assemblies are designed to be removable, foldable or collapsible to improve cargo capacity. However, such assemblies are typically bulky and cumbersome for the user to operate. The seat assembly may be heavy and require awkward actuation of release levers, causing difficulty in collapsing the seat assembly within the confined space of a vehicle interior. Further, the folded seats take up space and impinge on the desired cargo carrying capacity. Other seat arrangements provide for a rear seat assembly that is completely removable from the vehicle. A disadvantage of this design is that the seat must be stored in an independent storage area. Further, if the seat is needed or preferred, the stored seat may not be immediately available to the user, forcing an undesirable situation of having the occupants sit unrestrained in the cargo area, if necessary.
Examples of patents showing various seating and cargo configurations for enhanced capacity vehicles are U.S. Pat. No. 5,941,602 issued Aug. 24, 1999 to Sturt et al. and entitled xe2x80x9cFolding Seat Assemblyxe2x80x9d; U.S. Pat. No. 6,012,755 issued Jan. 11, 2000 to Hecht et al. and entitled xe2x80x9cFoldable Automotive Seatxe2x80x9d; U.S. Pat. No. 6,036,252 issued Mar. 14, 2000 to Hecksel et al. and entitled xe2x80x9cAutomotive Bench Seat with Fixed Rollers and Linear Floor Latchxe2x80x9d; U.S. Pat. No. 6,053,555 issued Apr. 25, 2000 to Neale and entitled xe2x80x9cRemovable Seat Assemblyxe2x80x9d; U.S. Pat. No. 6,123,380 issued Sep. 26, 2000 to Sturt et al. and entitled xe2x80x9cAutomotive Seat Assembly with Folding Structural Supports for Storage in a Foot Well for an Automotive Vehicle Bodyxe2x80x9d; U.S. Pat. No. 6,131,999 issued Oct. 17, 2000 to Piekny et al. and entitled xe2x80x9cFolding Vehicle Seat Assemblyxe2x80x9d; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,142,552 issued Nov. 7, 2000 to Husted et al. and entitled xe2x80x9cThird Automotive Seat Assembly for an Automotive Vehiclexe2x80x9d.
None of the above-described patents disclose a self-stowing rear seat assembly capable of being stowed away into the floor of the vehicle thereby providing full cargo space usage. Further, none of these patented seat assemblies provide a roll-up seat assembly having fully functioning head rests and occupant restraints while eliminating the need for large floor pan depressions or complete removal of the rear seat assembly from the vehicle.
It is therefor an object of the present invention to provide a self-stowing rear seat assembly in a vehicle seating system.
It is further an object of the present invention to provide a rear seat assembly that stows away into the floor of the vehicle thereby providing full cargo space usage.
It is still further an object of the present invention to provide a rear seat assembly having a roll-top configuration that rolls upward from a stored position into a fully functioning seat assembly equipped with head rests and occupant restraints.
It is another object of the invention to provide additional passenger and cargo space without requiring removal of the rear seat assembly from the vehicle.
Finally, it is an object of the invention to provide additional passenger and cargo space without necessitating a large floor pan depression in the floor of the vehicle to support the stored rear seat assembly.
The present invention overcomes the above referenced shortcomings of the prior art vehicle seat assemblies by providing a roll top seat assembly structure that is slidable between an active position and an inactive position. In the active position, the seat assembly is slid along opposing tracks located on either side of a vehicle""s interior sides to form a fully functioning rear seat equipped with head rests and seat belts. In the inactive position, the roll top seat assembly is slid along the opposing tracks to stow flat along the cargo floor of the vehicle""s interior, thereby providing the entire area with cargo room.